1. In your opinion, what were the main factors that led to the discovery and killing of Osama Bin Laden? In other words, who deserves credit for this remarkable accomplishment?

FMFP: Clearly there were several factors that lead to the capture and death of OBL. It appears undeniable, however, that the enhanced interrogation techniques used by the CIA – and criticized so vociferously by President Obama, AG Holder and virtually the entire liberal establishment – played a key role in getting the ball rolling. Some former Clinton staffers and others on the Left have come out and acknowledged this to their credit. We can only hope that the President decides to do the same, if not in words then through his actions by eliminating all talk of trying CIA interrogators who have proven so valuable in this War on Terror. As to credit, well many people deserve it, one of which is of course President Obama. He made the decision that we elected him to make and many Americans would have been disappointed if he did not make. Previous President Bush also deserves credit for putting into place policies that facilitated this event. Above all, though, the politicians should be much lower on the list of credit due than the military and intelligence officers who have actually prosecuted this war.

Pat: I have already stated that President Obama, former President Bush, Special Forces, CIA, and all the intelligence and military apparatuses that worked day in day out since 9/11 deserve our thanks for this accomplishment. I would also like to second, FMFP’s assertion that the much maligned CIA interrogators, who still this day are under investigation for wrong doing (a second investigation as they were already exonerated by one), need to be thanked for their service and sacrifices during one of the most stressful and tumultuous periods in our country’s history. They deserve our thanks, not our vindictiveness. It is likely true that without their efforts, Osama Bin Laden would still today be planning terrorist attacks on our homeland.

2. What does the killing of Osama Bin Laden mean for US national security? US foreign policy in Afghanistan and the Middle East?

Pat: Big question. The killing of Osama definitely hurts Al Qaeda’s short and long term capabilities, but by how much is uncertain. We will likely learn more in the next few weeks from the data uncovered during the attack, just how central Osama still was to their daily operations. Losing their most famous and unquestioned leader has to hurt the overall Islamist terrorist global movement, but I have no doubts that it is still alive and ticking throughout the globe. We can only hope that it’s ability to plan and implement a massive attack, such as 9/11, has been forever nullified. What his death means for the future of US policy in Afghanistan and the Middle East as a whole is much harder to answer. I have already heard numerous folks on the Right talk about declaring victory and getting out of Afghanistan and the Left has voiced this opinion for a couple years now. I can imagine there are a great many regular Americans out there who would feel much more comfortable getting our troops out of Central Asia now than they were a couple weeks ago. The President has so far not made any mention so far regarding changes to our Afghan policy, but the country will demand to hear rather soon if we are keeping our current strategy or making a change. President Obama has kept Afghanistan in the rearviewmirror publicly, almost never talking about it, but that will have to change real soon. Are we bring troops home since we killed the head of Al Qaeda? Or are we staying to fight the Taliban and the Al Qaeda elements inside of Afghanistan and Pakistan? The President needs to clarify his position, whether it has changed or not, very soon.

FMFP: Killing Osama probably doesn’t shift much in terms of our broader national security or the goals of our armed forces. It appears that he had a minimal role in the operation of al Qaeda so the various cells will certainly still continue planning and preparing attacks. This isn’t to minimize the impact of the death – it’s a huge deal and is a moral blow to terrorist networks around the world. Unfortunately, I do think this will open the door for Obama to pull out of Afghanistan and declare the mission over. This might have the effect of ceding Afghanistan back to the Taliban and a more general hands-off approach to the Middle East.

3. What does this successful mission mean for the Obama presidency?

FMFP: One smart political commentator that I have spoken to thinks it will be a permanent 3 point bump when all is said and done. This seems logical and likely. In a sense, Obama moved back to par when it comes to national security. He clearly still has Libya and the Middle East uprisings that he has so completely mismanaged but people are going to be happy to place these on the same level as the OBL killing when assessing his foreign policy acumen. In the end, though, this will not be a decider of elections one way or the other.

Pat: I think this is huge for President Obama. Obama’s commander and chief stature just exploded with this event and he is taking advantage of it. He unequivocally claimed responsibility for the successful attack during his speech, using ‘I’ many times, and released those great photos of him and his team watching. His team will wisely stretch this out for weeks.Obama can now also start to get out of Afghanistan without facing any significant claims of withdrawing in shame or not having resolve. This may turn out to be one of the more underestimated bonuses for the Obama team. All of a sudden, their position of wanting to get out of there is likely to be in line with a majority of the voters. This will of course also help please Obama’s base. How the President leads from here on out will determine how much of a lift this event has given his presidency. Just a week ago, his presidency seemed to be unraveling. Voter confidence was low in him, the economy, and America’s future. Even though Obama asked S&P to wait to hear his budget speech before their market judgment on American fiscal health, they still downgraded the US to ‘negative’. The slaying of Osama Bin Laden has given the President another chance to lead this country in the way he was elected to do so in the first place; in a bi-partisan, pragmatic, efficient manner. Unfortunately, for the country and Obama’s reelection hopes, he has so far done the exact opposite. It will be provocative to see if this changes his presidency in a truly meaningful way.

4. What do you think of the outward signs of happiness shown by the large crowds in New York, DC, around the country when the news was announced? Do you think this was appropriate?

Pat: While I wish we could all cheer over a signing ceremony of Al Qaeda’s formal surrender, I am fine with Americans celebrating Osama Bin Laden’s demise. This war will likely never have it’s V-Day like World War II and in a period where the enemy is so blurred and asymmetrical, this one case where we have clarity. Osama Bin Laden was a mass murder of Americans and hundreds of others. He dedicated his life (including what would have been his future) to the misery and death of the US and his personal destruction hurts his cause dearly. I have heard many from both sides of the aisle criticize the youthfulness of the revelers outside the White House, in New York City, etc. I disagree. Surely some of them are just using this as an excuse to ‘party’, but I’m sure most are celebrating the end of sad, scary era. An era were they never knew America before it became ‘Fortress America’ and they had to leave their shampoo at home when they flew or lose a relative or friend in one of the wars in Iraq or Afghanistan. I grew up in the booming 90′s and I remember thinking a year or so after 9/11, ‘dang, those were good times’. Those college kids didn’t get to enjoy those more peaceful, prosperous, less hyper political times. Osama Bin Laden changed their childhood for the worse and he has finally met his appropriate end. And for me personally, good riddance to human garbage and three cheers to all those that helped bring Osama to justice.

FMFP: I am generally fine with their sentiment. As Pat explained, this was a joyous day for America and Americans and these crowds embodied that feeling. My initial reaction was to look at the crowd and think it oddly similar in makeup to those same crowds that marched in the streets and chanted ridiculous slogans like, “Bush Lied, People Died” or “America Deserved It” Perhaps this is an irrational thought to have at a time like this but I just couldn’t help thinking feeling slightly skeptical of the sincerity of the crowd, specifically the young college students that dominated the scene (with pot smoke and drinking very visible). Anyway, I think the folks in NYC particularly were well within their right to celebrate this cathartic occasion.

Two quick items today:

A. I would like to give a hearty recommendation to Real Clear World’s ‘The Compass‘ blog. It has two main contributors, Greg Scoblete and Kevin Sullivan, with guest writers chiming in from time to time (like Rob and Hubbel, hey what happened to that guy?). The Compass brings a Realist perspective to pretty much every foreign policy issue of the day facing the United States and world. Though I am at times in disagreement, their critiques of neo-conservative and liberal internationalist rhetoric and policy perspectives is always clear, concise, and based on what they see as basic American or another state’s national interests. So check out The Compass, Real Clear World for links to numerous foreign affairs articles, and well you’re at it visit Real Clear Politics, my favorite domestic political site!

B. After the attack occurred, there was much written about the Jordanian double agent suicide strike that killed 7 CIA personnel and injured several others. Over the past month the story has inevitably faded from the newsstands and our conscience, but thankfully former CIA operative Robert Baer has kept the tragic incident and its important implications on his mind. Baer has written the definitive piece on the topic that I have seen so far and he finds many lessons that need to be relearned (yes, re-learned) by the CIA to prevent future ‘Khost’s from happening. Using his contacts in the intelligence world, Baer does his best to recreate the how the whole process of Humam Khalil Abu-Malal al-Balawi’s recruitment, infiltration of Al Qaeda, and finally his successful attack against the Khost CIA base. Weaved in this dramatic story is a harsh critique of Clinton era CIA Director John Deutch’s decision to downgrade the importance of and future prospects for, on the ground operatives. This process included ‘scrubbing’ all nefarious contacts (drug dealers, arms dealers, dictators) of the CIA’s slate and depending more on local intelligence groups to do the dirty work (i.e. Jordan’s intelligence operatives in the Balawi case). A provocative claim in a dramatic retelling of an important event. (Yes! 3 adjectives to 3 different nouns in one sentence! Too bad it’s not a good sentence )

A former intelligence official called it a “high-level asset meeting gone bad.” Bad is definitely an understatement. Of course the comment is in reference to the suicide attack which killed 7 CIA agents at Forward Operating Base Chapman in border province of Khost. They were “experienced frontline officers and their knowledge and expertise will be sorely missed,” said Henry A. Crumpton, who led the CIA campaign in Afghanistan in 2001 and 2002. The attacker was a potential informant of the Haqqani network of the Taliban and was wearing an Afghan National Army uniform at the time of the attack. Apparently, the perpetrator made it through one checkpoint and blew himself and several others away before he was to be searched for weapons. The Pakistani and Afghan Taliban have both claimed responsibility for the attack, with one specific Taliban leader stating that the attack was in revenge for CIA-led drone attacks.

This tragic incident highlights numerous issues challenging the US/NATO presence in Afghanistan. First off, it is indeed the nature of the covert intelligence game that one has to trust those who you really cannot trust. The CIA in Afghanistan need to gather information on Al Qaeda and the Taliban leadership and organization and to do this human intelligence is a vital component. After all, the drones don’t just know where the bad guys are hiding by themselves.

This specific incident, which involved a supposed Afghan Army member, also portrays the difficulties in discerning friend from foe. How serious is this issue to the Obama administration’s Afghan strategy? Vital would be an understatement. Key to future stability of Afghanistan, and to a lessening of a foreign military presence, is the growth in size and capability of the Afghan army and police. The Taliban of course know this and will do whatever they can to undermine its progress. A great way to do this is to infiltrate the Afghan army and police ranks with your own soldiers and inflict demoralizing and strategic calamities, such as this Chapman CIA incident and the shooting of five British soldiers by an Afghan police officer last month. Throw in the fact that the Afghan government, and its foreign purse holders, are desperate to build up the Army and police numbers and it should not surprise us that some ‘bad apples’ are mixed into the bunch. If I were the Taliban, this is what I would do.

Nevertheless, in terms of the CIA’s presence in Afghanistan, it is still critical to have an on the ground footprint in Afghanistan’s most volatile southeastern regions. The drone attacks have had a major impact on downgrading the Taliban and Al Qaeda’s leadership and the pressure must be maintained. This likely cannot happen if the CIA has to move out of Khost, Kandahar, etc. It has been reported that the CIA presence in Afghanistan is to increase by about 20-25% along with the surge in US/NATO troops this coming year, but one can bet that this Chapman attack will change some of the calculus on how the agency operates.

"War is Hard!"

Stanley McChrystal’s Long War – Dexter Filkins excellent profile  of America’s top commander in Afghanistan clearly showcases the challenges of going ‘all-in’ and ‘getting out’.  McChrystal comes off as vibrant, smart, and worthy General, but the task ahead of him is depicted as likely insurmountable. Here are some choice bits…

McChrystal on counterinsurgency:

“The insurgency has to have access to the people,” McChrystal told me. “So we literally want to go in there and squat among the people. We want to make the insurgents come to us. Make them be the aggressors. What I want to do is get on the inside, looking out — instead of being on the outside looking in.”

McChrystal on negotiating with parts of the Taliban:

“Pashtun culture adjudicates disagreements in a way that mitigates blood feuds. The Pashtun people go out of their way not to do things that cause permanent feuds. They have always been willing to change positions, change sides. I don’t think much of the Taliban are ideologically driven; I think they are practically driven. I’m not sure they wouldn’t flip to our side.”

Filkins felt that McChrystal had undervalued the importance of Karzai’s legitimacy:

But increasingly, McChrystal, as well as President Obama and the American people, are being forced to confront the possibility that they will be stuck fighting and dying and paying for a government that is widely viewed as illegitimate.

When I asked McChrystal about this, it was the one issue that he seemed not to have thought through. What if the Afghan people see their own government as illegitimate? How would you fight for something like that?

“Then we are going to have to avoid looking like we are part of the illegitimacy,” the general said. “That is the key thing.”

Filkins does a fair job in showing both sides of the debate facing the Obama administration right now, more troops to fight the Taliban or a more Al Qaeda-focused counterterrorism strategy, but the aspects that stayed with me the most were the words of Afghans in the Taliban controlled south who voiced their concern that the US could not be trusted because there was no telling how long they would be there.  On the other hand, the Taliban weren’t going anywhere.  This factor alone affects nearly all other strategic inputs and outputs.

Think Again: God – Vaunted religious historian Karen Armstrong tackles conventional wisdom on the role and importance of religion in today’s Western world.  Armstrong tackles such topics and ‘truths’ as ‘God is Dead’, ‘God and Politics Don’t Mix’, and ‘God Breeds Violence and Intolerance’.  Armstrong reminds us that religion continues to be a major factor in US culture and politics and international relations.

The Next 100 Years – Stratfor lead analyst George Friedman takes a stab at predicting the next century’s major geopolitical shifts and events.  Here’s his eye-grabbing introduction: “Japan and Turkey form an alliance to attack the US. Poland becomes America’s closest ally. Mexico makes a bid for global supremacy, and a third world war takes place in space….”

US Arms Sales – This is more a bit of news than an analysis, but the facts here tell an astounding story. American arms sales lead the world and its not even close.  The US sold nearly 70% of all global arms with total sales reaching nearly $38 billion.  Second place?  Italy with $3.7.  Now that’s a gap!

Assassination: A Brief History – This one’s pretty self explanatory.  Like all policies or strategies, assassination has its benefits and drawbacks.  

Iraq-Afghanistan-Pakistan Op-chart – A simple, but telling story of the progress in Iraq, and degradation of Afghanistan and Pakistan in the last few years.  Short and sweet geopolitical info!

The CIA in Double Jeopardy – Another good reason why the Obama administration should drop their prosecution of CIA agents.

That’s it.  Well, almost….

Obama To Enter Diplomatic Talks With Raging Wildfire

As much as I disagree with the CIA prosecution policy of the Obama administration, it has helped highlight a critical and complicated issue in US national security, international security, and for modern democracies.  Discussions by President Obama, ex-VP Dick Cheney, leading intellectuals, newspapers, and citizens, like us here at GPP, attests to this, and I hold up that we can find an acceptable, if not happy, medium.  In any regard, that’s all I’m going to say about that right now.  Well, almost.  Here’s two provocotive CIA/torture pieces worth checking out:  Liberal Columnist Richard Cohen looks at ‘Torture’s Unanswerable Questions‘ 2.  A high level debate on the issue spurred by Cohen’s piece.

The rest of this post will be as the title suggests, a hodge-podge of Great Power topics.  Are you pumped or what!?!  I am!!!

• Stratfor’s George Friedman takes a stab at reviewing the now concluded, opening stage of President Obama’s foreign policy.  Friedman’s take is centered on two related points: Obama’s policies are a lot like Bush’s and this is no surprise because state leaders’ foreign affairs decisions are shaped by ‘necessity’ and constrained by fundamental strategic interests.  Friedman is a Realist, and a consistent one, so this should not surprise.  The most interesting aspect of the review is Friedman’s geopolitical analysis of Obama’s ‘Reset’ policy with Moscow.  He sees an inherent problem with the strategy:

The problem, of course, was that the last thing the Russians wanted was to reset relations with the United States. They did not want to go back to the period after the Orange Revolution, nor did they want to go back to the period between the collapse of the Soviet Union and the Orange Revolution. The Obama administration’s call for a reset showed the distance between the Russians and the Americans: The Russians regard the latter period as an economic and geopolitical disaster, while the Americans regard it as quite satisfactory. Both views are completely understandable.

This is true for many international issues, as just because we desire ‘talks’, ‘resets’, ‘war’, etc. does not mean our ally or enemy want the same.  Conflicts happen for a reason.

• For only the 2nd time in decades, with this time looking to be much more consequential than the first, Japan has a new ruling party running its domestic and foreign affairs.  The perennially in power Liberal Democrats have been booted out of government and replaced by the Democratic Party of Japan and this will muddies the future Japan-US alliance, if even just a bit.  From their very existence, the Liberal Democrats were closely allied with the US, and the DPJ has held some troubling policy prescriptions toward its relations with the US while in opposition.  Though a sea change in relations is extremely unlikely, there is indeed some cause for concern, especially in regards to the presence of American military personnel on certain Japanese islands.  The Obama administration will need to show some agility in dealing with this new government and keeping the Japanese-American alliance strong.  A rather mundane, stable US foreign policy sphere has suddenly become a bit more exciting/worrying.

• Speaking of East Asia and Realism, Ian Bremmer and Nouriel Roubini wrote a short and sweet piece persuasively arguing that no one should expect to see US-China partnership any time soon.  Here is a list of the contrasting interests and positions that will keep them apart: 1. US focus on geopolitical headaches around the globe with China confining itself with geo-economic challenges 2. Both state governments have internal issues to keep their attention (economic, health care, Uighurs, baseball playoff races, etc.) 3. Internal bureaucratic infighting, especially in regards to a lack of cooperation with both Beijing and Washington’s respective State and Treasury Departments 4. Lastly, on major international security issues, like Iran’s pursuit of nuclear weapons, Russia’s moves in Eastern Europe, Hugo Chavez in Venezuela, climate change, the two behemoths have diverging positions.  What’s interesting about this piece by Bremmer and Roubini is that they make a Realist argument, but stress internal aspects (bureaucracy, domestic politics) as key factors.  Realist theory largely and mistakenly misses these factors by focusing too much on just the state and international actors.

• Speaking of Russia in Eastern Europe (at least I did a little bit ago), Moscow is having a good ol’fashioned great power row with Poland about who was more Nazi-friendly during World War II.  I know what you’re thinking….this is great-power-awesome!  Apparently, Russia has been releasing documents showing elements in Poland helped the Nazis, while the Polish are trying to remind Moscow that they invaded and conquered them in a partnership with the Third Reich!  It seems like this morbid diplomatic fight is not a real threat to Polish-Russian relations, just an interesting verbal spat.

• Apparently, the War on Terror may not be dead just yet.  Obama Press Secretary used the phrase in its proper context when defending Obama’s Afghan strategy.

• Just when you thought your great power work was done, here is a bloggingheads.tv video by two mostly well-spoken folks debating whether America will remain a great power, with the much more important question of How, being addressed as well.  Hat tip to my friends at Foreign Policy Association’s Rising Powers blog, specifically David Kampf, for this and for already picking out the discussion’s ‘money quote’:

“the greatest advantage that the United States has going forward is that as other countries become more powerful there is always going to be the feeling among their neighbors and among others in the world that they are going to view that apprehensively and I think they are going to look to the United States…to provide you with a security partner.”

Just like the Pittsburgh Pirates’ playoff chances, this post is finished!

There are many besides those in the Obama administration who think this is a good idea.  In fact, the New York Times and the Huffington Post are angry that these moves do not go far enough!  In one scary Huffington Post article, former Washington Post blogger Dan Froomkin calls the past administration a ‘Bush torture regime’ and compares this prosecution process to the Nazi Nuremburg trials!  Last time I checked waterboarding two known terrorists and verbally threatening a few others does not equal a Holocaust, but maybe I’m wrong.  I think Mr. Froomkin should start shopping at the perspective store.  Froomkin argues that Obama should go much further, worrying:

“The message for future federal employees faced with morally suspect orders will be clear: Do what you’re told to do, and we’ll cover your ass. And the message for future policymakers will be: If you can find someone at the Department of Justice to say it’s OK, then anything goes – literally, anything.”

Reread the last part.  ‘Anything goes’.  99% of CIA, military, FBI, and government officials acted appropriately and extremely diligently to protect US civilians, but apparently the Bush administration had an ‘anything goes’ policy that only Froomkin knew about.  Though not nearly preposterous as Froomkin’s ramblings was a New York Times editorial praising the Obama administration’s recent CIA exposure moves.  The editorial spends quite a bit of space talking about the Bush administration’s ‘moral repugnance’ and pushing for more investigations, but at no time, not one word, mentions how these CIA investigations and releases affects US national security.  It is easy to criticize an agency tasked with national security without mentioning why it did what it did in order to provide protection and whether or not its methods were effective or not.  If you want to advocate a high level investigation of CIA officials and former administration members, you at least must acknowledge the national security, agency morale, and future administration ramifications.

These CIA soldiers were told what they were doing was lawful and needed to protect the United States and now they fear for their livelihood. It would be wrong to pretend that this investigation will not have its negative impact, as according to some, it already has; as one anonymous CIA official concluded about his fellow agents:

“Their view is, they policed themselves and they turned themselves in.  Now they have to fight al Qaeda and the U.S. government at the same time.”

A little over dramatic, but true nonetheless. Current CIA Director Leon Panetta had this to say about the recent bad news: “This is in many ways an old story. … The use of enhanced interrogation techniques, begun when our country was responding to the horrors of Sept. 11, ended in January.  For the CIA now, the challenge is not the battles of yesterday, but those of today and tomorrow. It is there that we must work to enhance the safety of our country. That is the job the American people want us to do.”  The job of the CIA is to keep American citizens and interests safe, sometimes I think this is forgotten, especially if you read the aforementioned opinion pieces.

In this post, I have constantly referred to ‘President Obama’ and the ‘Obama administration’, not AG Eric Holder or the Justice Department, and I did so purposely.  Though the President has tried to distance himself from these recent policy decisions, he is ‘where the buck stops’ and a decision by Eric Holder is for all purposes a decision by the President, who appointed him and could fire him at any moment.  If Obama thinks this is best for our country he needs to stand up and explain why.  Where’s the leadership?  Where’s the Commander and Chief?  Imagine if you worked for the CIA and after releasing damaging, formerly classified documents a few months ago, the President came and made a big speech about how the CIA’s integrity was vital to our national security, but just a couple months later his administration is all over you again?  Would you feel safe?  Trusted?  An editorial by the Chicago Tribune ended poignantly:

One day, heaven forbid, there may be another attack on American soil. Once again, we will ask CIA and other agents to find out whatever they can, as quickly as possible, to defend this nation. How will they respond?

Heaven Forbid.

I listened (and kinda watched) Robert Baer’s presentation in front of the Commonwealth Club in San Francisco, found below. Baer, a former CIA agent and author of ‘The Devil We Know: Dealing with the New Iranian Superpower‘, is an astute and seasoned veteran of US-Iran relations. He is a strong believer that the US must look past President Ahmadinejad’s erratic behavior and focus on the real center of Iran’s power, Ayatollah Khamenei, who he sees as a rational political being. Baer extends his argument by asserting that the Shia of the Middle East are overall more predictable and rational than their Sunni brethren. In any case, the main point from Baer is that the US can and should negotiate the Iranian state.

The debate over whether the Islamic Republic of Iran is a rational state like all others in the international system is an important one with obvious implications. I have covered the issue at least twice in my academic career, writing a paper that argued Iran should be considered a normal state (Iran: Welcome to the Nuclear Family), and one that argues the opposite (Iran’s Continuous Revolution). In the first paper, I argued that a nuclear armed Iran would act rationally like other states armed with such a destructive weapon, cautiously. The second paper argued that ever since the 1979 Islamic-controlled revolution the state has been led by leaders who have in many ways gone against international norms and followed irrational foreign policies.

I think Bush looked at the Iranian regime the way my second paper did, as a state that would not follow the rules and couldn’t be dealt with directly. Judging by Obama’s early rhetoric and call for direct negotiations, one has to think he believes the country’s leaders are rational and in turn can be diplomatic partners. Though contrary to most accounts, the Bush administration did at times ‘talk’ with Iranian counterparts, but usually only on low levels. The past administration also joined the Europeans in making the Iranian state several decent offers to stop enriching uranium, but without success or really even any signs of progress. Obama has led one to believe he will take a more forward approach to the Iranian regime, but exactly how still remains to be seen. I doubt Obama himself will head to Tehran any time soon, but one can see him sending Sec of State Clinton to meet with Iran’s equally prominent Foreign Minister at a neutral site in Europe some where.

The Obama administration’s progress in terms of US-Iran negotiations (besides the nuclear issue, Iran is an important player in Afghanistan and Iraq’s present and future) will largely depend on reciprocal diplomatic advancements from the Ayatollah, and that is where the previous argument comes back into play. What drives Ayatollah Khamenei and his partners? Do they seek to spread their version of Shia Islam across the Middle East, destroy Israel, and battle the ‘Great Satan’ United States as long it exists? Or is the state just following pragmatic policies that strengthen it at home and abroad?

Barack Obama has made some serious foreign policy decisions and symbolic gestures in his first three days in office.  Let’s take a look at them:

1. Gitmo, Torture, CIA – Obama has signed executive orders halting the CIA’s use of detention centers, requiring that the CIA must follow the Army Field Manuel’s interrogation tactics only, aka no waterboarding, and ordered the closing of Gitmo prison within one year.  Obama and his staff have given themselves some leeway in these accords, however.  For instance, Obama set up a Task Force to look deeper into this issues and possibly to come up with certain caveats to such issues as rendition, military commissions for those deemed too dangerous and ‘unreleasable’.  Also, though Obama called for the closing of Gitmo in a year and for immediate legal procedures there to stop, he has acknowledged that the closing process “is more difficult than I think a lot of people realize”

Following this story, there have been many reports of happy American citizens and a world rejoicing, while at the same time others are warning that these could be dangerous moves.  I personally want America to represent and to be the greatest example for individual freedom and progress in the world, and therefore I am happy to see many American and world citizens who were disenchanted feel that the US was now back to representing its ideals, but I myself did not need these for the moment largely symbolic gestures by Obama to make me feel that way.  I want the US to live up to its ideals, and to a large extent I believe it has.  Has the US tortured or assisted through rendition the torturing of people?  Yes.  Who have they done this to?  The CIA claims to have only water-boarded 3 people, all Al Qaeda senior members, including KSM, the mastermind planner behind 9/11.  If any of you read the 9/11 commission, it seemed like 80% of its information came from KSM, and this information came after he spilled the beans under water boarding.  

I do not support torture and it should be US policy not to do it.  However, it would be dishonest if I didn’t believe it should be at least thought to be used in extreme circumstances.  Considering Gitmo, the US has also been guilty of harboring innocents, people that were rounded up mistakenly.  This is indeed wrong and the when it is proven that these people are innocent the US government needs to make it up to them and their families as much as humanly possible.  But just like the water-boarding issue, this is a crime the US has committed very few times.  I know once is too much, but we need to be realistic.  We are fighting an amorphous, fanatical enemy who refuses to play by any rules.  Yet we are forcing ourselves to play by what seems like a million.  I understand this is why we are different and better and I’m fine with that.  But why is so disproportionate a focus on American ‘torture’ and ‘malevolence’ and not on those who disregard all rules and desire Western and American existence?  

Prisoners at Gitmo

The New York Times ran this important article yesterday detailing the pitfalls of letting certain Gitmo prisoners free.  In this case, militant Said Ali al-Shihri was released to Saudi Arabia’s custody and it only took him about a year to lead an Yemen Al Qaeda unit in an attack on the US embassy in Sana, where 16 people were killed.  What was the Bush Administration thinking releasing this guy?  Saudi Arabia can obviously not be trusted.  Back to the question I posed at the end of the last paragraph, where are the denouncements of guys like Said Ali al-Shihri, who apparently lives to kill innocents?  I heard a lot of criticize of the US Gitmo base and for torture in the last year since the Sana embassy bombing, but I haven’t read much about this murderer.  This goes out to the international community that is reportedly happy that ‘America is good again.’  Well maybe if America was a little ‘less good’ it would have kept this guy in prison and saved those people’s lives.

I’ve gotten a little too long about this one topic, so let me just link the other important Obama foreign policy moves and discuss them tomorrow.

A. Outta Iraq?

B. Geithner to Lead Obama’s Currency Charge against China?

C. ‘War on Terror’ Gone?

D. Middle East Envoy George Mitchell, Afghanistan-Pakistan Envoy Richard Holbrooke – Aww what the heck, I think their strong choices put in charge of extremely difficult cases with little chance to make real progress, but good luck!

Just as we were discussing the challenges of running an intelligence agency in a democracy, a story breaks showcasing exactly how complicated it can be. The New York Times has broken a story that the Bush administration flat out stopped an attack on Iran’s nuclear program by Israel earlier this year. Israel did not even request full participation, just bunker busting bombs, Iraq overflight rights, and refueling. The Bush administration would not go along with it, for reasons that I want to discuss in post tomorrow when I have more time. In any case, this is an interesting storyline to read, ‘Bush stops attack on Iran’, as in the past three years I have read many ‘reports‘ that claimed Bush was going to launch a massive attack. Seymour Hirsch of the New Yorker was especially loud about this prediction.

Another part of this story, the one involving the CIA directly, is that it appears that the US tried to assuage the Israelis, though this was definitely not the only reason, by stating that it had launched a major covert operation, which hopefully combined with tough financial sanctions, would stop the Iran’s nuclear program.  Reading about this ‘covert’ plan to disable Iran’s nuclear plants, specifically at Natanz, in the New York Freaking Times, made me think ‘how is this covert? and should the NYTimes be printing this?’  The job of the media is to be a watchdog and make sure our government is responsibly led, but is reporting American secret intelligence and spy tactics in an ongoing process going over the line?

Anyway, there’s a lot to this story and this is all I can write about right now, but there is always tomorrow.  I’ll be back tomorrow, but please let me know what you think about this whole mess.